hai everybody, desperately i need to understand the execution plan and flow of joins or any other queries using 'set showplan_text on'. i am getting the output, but the iam not getting the flow i.e. which part is executed first, from bottom or up [ how to read the lines which are sepearted by ||...] in which joins are executed.. so many.. can anyone show me some light FOR EG: |--Nested Loops(Left Outer Join, OUTER REFERENCES:([c].[DEPARTMENTID])) |--Table Scan(OBJECT:([sample].[dbo].[GRADE] AS [c])) |--Nested Loops(Inner Join) |--Table Scan(OBJECT:([sample].[dbo].[employee] AS [A]), WHERE:([A].[departmentid]=[c].[DEPARTMENTID])) |--Table Scan(OBJECT:([sample].[dbo].[department] AS [B]), WHERE:([B].[departmentid]=[c].[DEPARTMENTID]))

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